


liquid nights

by xochisui



Category: Naruto
Genre: Established Relationship, Fluff, Light NSFW/Smut, M/M, Romance, Writer Itachi & Chef Shisui
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-06-09
Updated: 2020-06-09
Packaged: 2021-03-04 04:14:21
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,200
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/24627625
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/xochisui/pseuds/xochisui
Summary: too hot for holding hands / so we'll swim in each other's eyes insteadBased on malignedaffairs' modern AU
Relationships: Uchiha Itachi/Uchiha Shisui
Comments: 7
Kudos: 84
Collections: ShiIta is Love✨HashiMada is Life





	liquid nights

The plane of his chest must make for a comfortable enough pillow, the right amount of firm and smooth, with a steady, languid heartbeat for a lullaby. The face nestled there now, turned to one side with his ear and cheek pressed just below Itachi’s left clavicle, serves as a testament to this. Their pulses merge into a single echoing song, balmy air wrapped around them like a closed palm.

Being blanketed by Shisui’s body like this, his solid weight draped on top of him and between his legs, would be more welcome if it were any other season.

From the window left cracked open several centimeters through the night, a warm breeze flutters in. It’s going to be an exceptionally hot one again, it says. Itachi lays still in response, content not to move. His long hair fans out thickly around his head on the pillow, sweat glistening at his hairline and pricking his skin. He gazes idly toward the light seeping in, the dawn blueness whitening already into pure sun. This time of year, the sunlight claws away at the dark and disturbs his sleep even earlier (and he has always been an early riser to begin with). Notes of birdsong filter in, affirming he is not the only one.

The two of them have been awake in bed like this for more than an hour now. Making love, fucking, clinging to the dim air and sweat-cooled sheets.

It’s left his body pleasantly sore all over, sufficiently littered with hickeys and other love-marks, as is Shisui’s. Mapping out their points of meticulous fixation along the other’s skin. Just as he’d wondered how the heat doesn’t completely sap Shisui’s energy, it seemed to take its toll, and they collapsed as they are now, a perfume of sweat and semen hanging over them.

Itachi glances down the length of his lover, a messy crown of curls taking up his vision.

_Let’s spend the day together_ , he’d murmured. Which Itachi has no objection to—just not smothered into a sticky heap of body heat like this. Making a move at last, he takes his index finger and presses it at the soft mid-region of Shisui’s exposed cheek. _Enough pretending to be asleep_ , it urges wordlessly. One eye cracks open in reply, meeting his stare with a light hum and a not-so-apologetic grin.

“You’re like a nipple vampire,” comes Itachi’s dry remark, once Shisui peels himself away and exposes the damage his shoulders covered while they dozed. Rings of teeth-marks purple each dark areola. A lighter shade of marks trails down to his hipbone and around his navel.

“You seemed to like it.”

Itachi doesn’t respond.

He sits up and watches Shisui’s movements as he clothes himself, cotton briefs first then a t-shirt with a band logo (one of his own, Itachi observes silently) tugged over his head. The humidity makes his hair even wilder than usual. Itachi practically has to drag his gaze away, already feeling desire threaten to simmer into a too-obvious ache.

Shisui catches his guilty stare, and smiles a guilty one of his own. “Here”—he tosses Itachi’s underwear to him on the bed, landing it by his crotch—"You’re not planning on staying naked all day, right? Not that it doesn’t suit you.”

“I should probably shower first, actually.”

“You want me to come in with you?”

“That’s not necessary.” Itachi tries to keep his voice casual, but they can both feel the charge stirring in the hot air – the roguish quality of Shisui’s curls in the heat, Itachi’s own hair unkempt from its usual tie and spilling over his shoulders. The flushed marks peeking from between Shisui’s thighs and along Itachi’s chest. He becomes shy of his own nudity suddenly, despite their earlier activities. “It’ll just be a quick one.”

Somewhat quickly, his underwear bunched in one hand and subtly poised over his member, he drags himself from the bed and steals past Shisui, out the doorway and into the bathroom.

“I’ll make breakfast, then,” comes Shisui’s call just as he slides the door shut.

The water hits him in a blast of welcome cold. 

What is it about this weather that makes it seemingly impossible for them to keep their hands off each other? They’re not teenagers anymore, desperate to explore each other – but perhaps the distance from home, since they _are_ older, is a factor that fuels this drive, regardless of the temperature outside. Itachi mulls it over as he drenches his hair and lets it soak through, suppressing a shiver as the frigidity engulfs him in its spray. He lets water fill his cupped palms, brings it up to smooth over his face, refreshingly cool now that he’s acclimated to it. Thoughts cluster his mind, build up force and begin to stream through with countless mundane things: a checklist of what he will get done this week, where his appetite will take him for lunch later today. Ideas he mentally jots down, ideas he grows bored with practically upon conception. He gathers his hair up into a shampooed nest, and a nape-kiss sensation intrudes his imagination as rivulets of suds slide down. A small breath escapes his lips. Even alone, he can practically feel Shisui’s bare arms sliding over his ribs to wrap around him from behind, in that teasing way when he’s spacing out again. Anchoring him like gravity. They’ve stood here in such position so many times, they’ve impressed the ghosts of touch onto the walls, left feet-shaped heat signatures in close pairs together on the bath floor.

Showering has begun to incite the opposite effect Itachi intended, which acts as his cue to get out. He finishes scrubbing himself down perfunctorily and shuts the water off.

In the kitchen, into an aroma of fresh rice and eggs, he softly pads dressed in loose pants and a clean shirt, himself smelling and feeling fresher as well.

The teapot is already set on the table, their bowls and utensils set on opposite sides. Their small, outdated television murmurs on low volume in the background, snippets of a newscast rehashing more about the heatwave that’s strangling the area floating through the air, over the whir of a portable fan at full blast. Preoccupied at the stove, Shisui doesn’t turn around to greet him. Itachi’s shirt settles against his back tighter than it tends to on him.

Itachi approaches from behind, mimicking the other’s behavior when Itachi is the one rapt in focus on a task (a reversal Shisui finds endearing, as with most things Itachi has learned and copied from him), and wordlessly rests his chin on the other’s shoulder.

“Work called,” Shisui announces softly. “I have to go in this afternoon, after all.”

“Ah.” Itachi falters slightly. Whatever flirty, corny thing he’d thought to say, if only to get a laugh out of the other, fades before it can form. “I see.”

It was too good to be true that they’d both get an entire day off together. No doubt Shisui has already attempted to get one of his coworkers to trade shifts with him, to no avail.

Shisui peers to where Itachi’s face lingers close to his chin, their cheeks nearly brushing. His smile is consoling. “Sorry.”

“It can’t be helped.” Pensively, he lets the disappointment roll off of him. Adopts Shisui’s steadier, fluid attitude. “I’ve got some work I probably shouldn’t put off, either, I suppose.”

“No such thing as a day off in your profession, huh?” Turning to face him, Shisui leans his hip against the stove and eyes him with his usual air of mirth, that glint of hovering on the brink of revelation. Even like this, sweaty and still bed-headed and not wearing pants, his gaze sets Itachi’s heart racing. “But we still have the whole morning together, you know.”

Heat shimmers atop the roof of every house and building and food stall they pass. It blurs the horizon into swimmy, insubstantial territory, pools of it hovering mirage-like over the asphalt before they branch onto the dirt path from the main road that leads into town. Sunspots bloom in their vision when they drop their gazes to their feet to escape the brightness, when they cross into a patch of shade, kaleidoscopic behind their eyelids. In the trees, cicadas shrill. As if the light itself emits sound. 

Neither of them are talkative. But theirs has always been a quiet, almost telepathic camaraderie, from long before they became lovers. Shisui peeks to his right, and Itachi flashes a grin back that matches his boyfriend’s. The morning belongs to them, just like he said.

As they near the river, the sound of insects intensifies: dragonflies whir through the air, regal and frantic at once, and mosquitoes hover at their ears. The trees thicken around them before opening out into the rocky banks down the slope. The smell of it, the sound of its gurgling, envelopes them before they set eyes on its glittering length.

The water distorts their bodies as they wade in; makes it appear as though their legs are severed, running parallel and separate to the rest of them. An optical illusion that used to fascinate Shisui as a child, slipping his fingers under the surface and watching them break off at certain angles. Calves-deep, they make their way to a favorite perch in the cliff’s shade, scattering tiny schools of fish in their wake and stepping gingerly over jelly-like clumps of tadpole eggs in the shallows.

They’ve been coming here since they were children. A myriad of summer days lays over every stone and blade of grass, countless memories that Shisui imagines rush through him each time he steps into the water, rising up into the air. It’s still quite hot, but least here it’s not as stagnant as the air hanging over the street or back in their bedroom, with the water churning up a bit of coolness; the river is a breathing entity, its lungs buried deep in the loam, under the bedrock.

“Tell me about what you’re working on.”

He’s gazing up at Itachi, arms criss-crossed and pillowed on the other man’s lap. Learning forward and immersed up to his waist wearing only shorts and sandals, meanwhile Itachi remains seated on the small ledge with his pants rolled up to his knees and ankles dipped in the liquid cool.

“I have a deadline tomorrow for a book review. It shouldn’t take me long.”

“And your other project?”

There’s a self-conscious pause as Itachi tries to articulate himself. Tries to word a feeling undecipherable except to other creatives. “It’s…still forming. Mostly in my head, I have to admit. I can never quite decide how I want certain parts to play out. Or more accurately, what feels most appropriate.”

_You_ are _a perfectionist_ , Shisui doesn’t say. Instead, he offers, “Maybe more research will clarify something. Let’s go to the city one of these days and hit a museum. What do you say?”

Itachi smiles at the bait, with an endeared look that also says he’s not buying it. “It _does_ sound tempting,” he admits wryly. The chilly air and reverent quiet of the history center he’s loved visiting since childhood, even a dim corner desk at the library could swallow up an entire relaxing day for the both of them. Shisui knows his vices a little too well. “But it seems like just another form of procrastination, don’t you think? For now, the notes I have are sufficient. And anyways, it doesn’t look like either of us will have that much time.”

“Not an abundance, but even half a day is enough, right?” His grin stretches lopsided. “Just like this.”

Itachi combs his fingers gently through Shisui’s hair. It lulls him, soft as a caress. Sends warmth spreading through him from his nape to his fingertips, different and distinct from the heat; giddier. Answer enough that this time is, indeed, precious, without having to say so. Shisui lays his cheek against his arm, lets his gaze un-focus out toward where the river stretches on seemingly endless. It occurs to him that from above, he might resemble a merman lingering at the surface, clinging to a human companion the way they do in fairytales. The idea amuses him. Maybe later he’ll yank Itachi down into the water with him, so that they’re equally soaking wet, to even things out. He’ll endure Itachi’s exasperation at such a childish move (that they both know is really more for propriety’s sake than any real disappointment) before winning him back over with laughter. But right now, he’s too content in this position. Blood roaring in his ear that’s pressed against skin like the sea. “You know, if you’re having trouble sorting out your thoughts, you can always ramble them off to me until you talk it out with yourself. I’m happy to just listen.”

The story so far is this: two men, their lives intertwined like roots from a single seed, are sworn to each other through an oath of blood. A terrible crime hangs overhead, a dark secret.

The backdrop is a historical fiction based on Itachi’s research into ninja clan dynamics and culture, particularly between the famed Iga and Kōka villages during the late Sengoku period, and infused with tinges of mythological surrealism. The subject matter has fascinated Itachi since he was young, when he used to stay up late babysitting Sasuke and they’d watch documentaries together on the history network. The last few years have seen Itachi’s interest renewed with more thorough research (much to his quiet enjoyment, as Shisui correctly implied) into accurately portraying the kind of weaponry and tactics they employed, training, and not to mention studying the nuances of their clandestine society.

Itachi grapples with the idea of allowing his pair of protagonists to be lovers.

Three endings sit in his mind, each a different narrative path he’s loosely outlined in a notebook and progressively grimmer than the prior version, the last one practically all bitter with little sweet.

Tragedy seems to suit these characters for whatever reason that Itachi can’t quite pinpoint. Like Achilles and Patroclus, like Atsumori and the rest of the ill-fated Taira. Aesthetically, he sort of likes that deceptively avoidable inevitability that needles through the heart, the cathartic melancholy that makes one yearn to start all over again. But he also fears the overall narrative will become too weighed down with despair. One or both of his leads will die, he feels, and layering romance over their relationship will only twist the knife. Happy endings rarely come across as realistic to him, though, especially for two shinobi.

The café where Itachi sits agonizing over these matters is more crowded than usual today, no doubt on account of more than just the regulars wanting shelter from the sun as well as cool refreshments. A plate of bare dango skewers rests on the other side of his open laptop, and he’s contemplating ordering more to go with a refill of tea to keep himself hydrated. It’s something of a bad habit of his, devouring sweets while he writes. _You never gain an ounce of weight, since you burn up all those calories thinking_ , Shisui has remarked about it. Still, he should probably practice _some_ self-control.

After relaxing for a couple hours at the river earlier, they returned home briefly to shower the river smell off of their skin (together this time, with the added distractions from simply cleaning themselves entailing) and split off their separate ways. Shisui toward the restaurant where he works as a line cook as part of his culinary training, and Itachi to his favorite café, at a small square table near the back where the harsh sunlight spilling through the glass near the front can’t reach him.

His phone buzzes suddenly, a clackety sound on the glossy wood. _Are you coming home soon?_ the message reads.

_Of course. Your birthday is coming up, isn’t it?_

_As if you’d forget_.

He exhales a silent laugh through his nose, at the remark as much as at the welcome distraction. Then jokes back at Sasuke: _Do you think I can get away with bringing a plus-one or will it upset father too much?_

_Just bring him over. It’s not like mom and dad are going to kick you out._ The last sentence has the ‘Favorite Child’ accusation dripping from every word, even if it’s conveyed through his younger brother’s brand of light-hearted bluntness.

_It’s more complicated than that._

The two men Itachi centers his story around are, predictably, versions of himself and Shisui. At their cores at least, behind a wall of distance from their real-world counterparts through a narrative lens, layers of traits and experiences that distinguish them.

The “Shisui” on the pages of his novel is not the real one, nor is the main character really _him_. He knows this. And yet it’s inevitably because of this blatant resemblance that he grows more attached to them the more the story unfolds, that he roots for them. Over the years of its gradual formulation, the story has begun to evolve from an exploration of trauma into something just as personal but far less morbid. In this fashion, Shisui is more of a muse to him than even Itachi had realized at first; he grabs Itachi’s wrist gently to get his attention, wipes a bit of food from the corner of Itachi’s mouth with his thumb after letting Itachi taste an experimental recipe, and the shinobi characters mirror them. It’s becoming more a diary than a novel in that way, a collection of intimate moments immortalized through his own projections of fantasy. But it’s these softer moments that seem to make the storytelling worthwhile.

He’s being rather self-indulgent and can’t help but scrutinize himself for it. The characters want to live, want to be triumphant, and Itachi is the one holding them hostage between the burden of faithfully recreating the deadly environment of their era and his own gentler desires.

_Why would it be complicated?_

_I’m just worried it’ll feel tense. I don’t want to ruin your party by making things awkward._

_I think father is afraid of you being mad at him, too. He keeps asking me what we talk about or when you’ll come back to visit. Maybe you should talk to him._

He stares at his phone screen. At a standstill in terms of writing, and at sorting out his own feelings on the matter of his relationship with his father, Sasuke’s sincerity and concern staring back at him. It’s been well over four months since he and his father have said so much as a word to each other.

A year ago, their falling out seemed to hold a heavy note of finality to it.

_Maybe you’re right. I’ll call him one of these days_.

And yet, Itachi thinks, would that kind of self-indulgence really be so bad in a story? Don’t his characters – doesn’t he – deserve a small piece of unrealistic happiness, some wistfulness that doesn’t bring them punishment just for hoping for the best?

Itachi scoots his notebook close and speedily jots down his thoughts before they evaporate, giving birth to this fourth possible ending that’s begun to swirl around and steadily pick up traction in his mind, somewhere in which suffering and fate don’t have to be conflated into one another. In the margins next to it, he notes ‘ _maybe_.’

Maybe.

“He’s in the back. You can go through the kitchen if you’d like. We’re about finished up.”

Itachi murmurs a “Thanks” and follows the waiter around the counter, past circular tables with the chairs already stacked on top. 

This time when Itachi enters, Shisui turns.

He catches a glimpse of exhaustion on the other’s face, and then in an instant it disappears, his usual sunny expression spreading over.

“Hey.”

“Hey,” Itachi returns.

The kitchen is warm, bordering on uncomfortable. It must have been worse earlier, by the looks of Shisui donning a headband to keep the sweat from his face, his skin still shiny in the fluorescent lighting, nonetheless. He finishes wiping down the stove, craning his neck back toward Itachi. As if reading his mind, he remarks, “You’d think on a day like this, I wouldn’t be cooking with frying oil so much.”

“Good thing I got something to cool you down.” Itachi holds out the iced drink he bought at the café, the fragrance of strong tea and blended spices wafting out.

“My hero!” Shisui exclaims in a sing-song tone that gets a chuckle out of him. He drinks as if he’s parched (and he likely is), gulping it down appreciatively for a long moment. 

Itachi watches him, softening. “You look tired.”

“Well, I feel better already.”

“Just from the tea, huh?” he teases.

“Just from seeing you.”

And just like that, Shisui leans forward and kisses him deeply. The taste of cinnamon-sweetness hits his tongue, washes out all thoughts of anything else in that instant. There’s something dreamlike about being kissed like this in an empty kitchen after hours, before a pang of self-awareness snaps him awake.

“Someone might…”

“It’s fine. Nobody else comes back here.”

Their mouths meld again, a hunger growing now, hands finding each other’s waists. The second time, it’s Shisui who breaks away first.

“Mn. I just remembered. I got something for you, too.”

Before Itachi can protest, he’s strolling to the tall industrial fridge. “Sit there and close your eyes,” he instructs.

Itachi obeys (what else can he do, when his boyfriend seems this excited?), perching himself on the stool by the counter, a wry amusement on his lips as he warily shuts his eyes. He blinks them opens at the clink of something being set in front of him.

“You saved this for me?” It looks positively decadent – a dense square of lemon cake with candied cherry blossoms garnished on top, a creamy glaze frozen mid-dribble over the sides. Like a work of art plucked out of a foodie magazine.

“Not saved it, I _made_ it.” Shisui beams. “Just for you and no one else. Go on and try it.”

Once again, Itachi obeys.

“It’s incredible.” It’s said with a kind of reverence. He knows Shisui doesn’t consider himself an artist, but there’s no other word that really captures the mastery of what Shisui does with food. “How did you find time to make this?”

“I guess I’m just an efficient guy.”

Even while humble, the effect of Itachi’s praise brings out a glow in Shisui; his reddened cheeks have nothing to do with the heat, it’s a smiling-too-wide kind of ruddiness. He drags another stool close to Itachi and sits, sipping on more of the tea Itachi brought him, that’s already left a ring-shaped puddle of condensation on the clean counter. Content to watch his boyfriend savor his gift.

“Here.” Itachi holds out a chunk of cake on his fork, palm cupped beneath for any crumbs, up to Shisui’s lips and urges him to taste it, too. To appreciate his own work the way Itachi does. And grins at Shisui’s pleased expression, the two of them sitting knee-to-knee and eating together with the whole kitchen all to themselves, as if they’re in their own little pocket away from the rest of the world. “Any specific reason why you made me cake today?”

“Come on, Itachi, how long have I known you?” It’s a rhetorical question, as is when he follows with, “Don’t you think I know by now how to love you?”

It’s almost nightfall when they leave the restaurant. The time of evening when everything loses its features and fades out into inky silhouettes, the sunset a tangerine glow pulsating from the horizon. The scant light continues to drain away the whole walk home until all that’s left comes from fireflies flickering close to the grass, and they can no longer make out each other’s faces. Their kiss still burns on Itachi’s lips, it hurries his steps along so they can make it inside. It causes his hands to fumble uncharacteristically with the key at the door, until Shisui kisses him again, somehow finding him square in the dark, and centers him in this moment. Heady desire that’s been bubbling determinedly beneath the surface hangs undeniably between them now, as palpable as the humidity. Neither of them bothers to turn on any of the lights once they’re through the door, too preoccupied with trying to undress each other as they stumble across the hall, halfway there before they even hit the bed.

Itachi’s head falls back into an opened mouth look of surrender, throat bared for Shisui's lips, that column of bitable flesh and fluttering pulse. Shisui ravages the tender area under his jaw, trailing bruises down to his collar bone in his wake, and Itachi feels his most vulnerable place engorge steadily until he overflows. Their bodies, tangled like serpents in heat, merge into a solitary shape as they peel and discard every last layer separating them. Balmy breaths pooling in the crook of Itachi's neck where Shisui's face fits like a broken shard pressed back against the whole.

Once again, they melt into each other, like darkness into night.


End file.
